


just when you're ready to take on the world

by agonizer



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: M/M, pre-star trek into darkness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-12
Updated: 2016-06-12
Packaged: 2018-07-14 16:25:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 729
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7180118
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/agonizer/pseuds/agonizer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It shouldn’t come as a surprise to him, McCoy thinks, when he opens the door to his dorm room one night of many to find Jim Kirk standing in front of it, his lip burst, his nose bleeding, and dark bruises already forming on his cheek and jaw.</p>
            </blockquote>





	just when you're ready to take on the world

It’s been two weeks since the _incident_ , the legend, if you will—an unqualified student taking over the captain's duty, saving the world in the progress. The buzz is just wearing off, and reality is settling in. They’ve lost friends and colleagues, brothers and sisters, and aforementioned captain? Still a suspended student, a kid who’s had his taste of purpose for the first time in his life and is now facing an uncertain future, unsure whether he'll ever get the taste out of his mouth or will get to taste it again.

So it shouldn’t come as a surprise to him, McCoy thinks, when he opens the door to his dorm room one night of many to find Jim Kirk standing in front of it, his lip burst, his nose bleeding, and dark bruises already forming on his cheek and jaw. McCoy dreads to imagine what the rest of him looks like, like he always does, but at the same time, he wouldn't know how to refuse the kid if he wanted to, so all he says is "God damn it, Jim," and ushers him in.

Jim quietly complies. He doesn't stumble, his eyes are bright if downcast, it's obvious he has barely even been drinking. He's been getting in trouble for the sake of it, for the bruises alone. It's nothing new, Bones knows that much, yet it's always a shattering sight.

Without a word, just a small, apologetic smile, completely unlike the James T. Kirk everyone else knows, Jim sits down on the foot of McCoy's bed, and, just as wordlessly, McCoy pours a glass of whiskey and hands it over, before he makes his way into the bathroom to return with the few meds stored there; and antiseptic and something to wipe Jim’s face with, it isn't much, but then again, this doesn't need much.

_They_ don't need much.

Jim takes a sip of his whiskey, absently licking his lips once he brings the glass down to keep it in both hands resting on his knee. His hands are still shaking, Bones notes, excess adrenaline, his body's buzzing still with the aftermath of whatever he's been doing even when the blood's already dried.

Wetting the cloth with the antiseptic, Bones inspects Jim's face for a moment, tipping his jaw up and turning his face slowly. It isn't because of medical interest, he knows, and Jim probably does, too, yet neither of them mentions it. Hidden beneath bruises, dirt and blood, a face too young for his body, too innocent, and a history far too old for it at the same time.

McCoy doesn't get far cleaning up the mess. He couldn't, not with Jim watching him intently at the distance of just a few inches, eyes wide, lips slightly parted, a lost boy looking for everything and nothing. Never could refuse him, he notes wryly in the back of his mind, but he leans in no less.

It's a chaste brush of lips for all of a heartbeat, then Jim is pushing already, the glass of whiskey drops to the floor as he starts clutching at Bones' shirt, pulls him closer while he's pushing against him already, pushing, always pushing, and Bones complies, steadies himself with his hands on Jim's arms.

Bones can taste the burn of liquor and copper alike, and some romanticized part of his brain names it defiance, and then his brain shuts up for good and lets instinct take over.

It's needy, it always is, clumsy but so sure, teeth dragging over sensitive skin, hands exploring bruises on familiar planes, the taste of blood always with them, teeth clacking together in frenzied kisses that tear Jim's lip open again, and soon it's skin on skin, ragged breaths and sounds neither will admit to making.

Bones knows he isn't _kissing it better_ , knows this won't exist in the morning--it never does. But he tricks himself into believing that time and again. The fleeting moments worth having nothing but hazy memories of this afterwards, intangible, like it never happened. And they need this. Need this like Jim needs his bar fights to feel alive, like Bones needs a purpose not to drown.

So they sink into each other instead, the whiskey stains on the carpet the only thing that's going to be left of this in the morning.

And either way, it's alright.


End file.
